Letters: Climate plan, Gaza, Hamas and more

Alarmist climate talk meant to end oil use

San Diego City Council members Gloria, Alvarez and Emerald are trying to stampede Mayor Faulconer and the rest of the city council into adopting measures that will only make this town even less competitive and more expensive to live in (“Council trio ask mayor to act on climate plan,” July 24).

Why is it that at the same time that a level-headed nation like Australia abolishes its carbon tax and repudiates all cap and trade agreements, California and San Diego persist in believing the man-made climate change hooey?

One can only attribute this rock hard belief in man-made global warming to soaring conceit; delusions of grandeur on an incredible scale. Mankind can no more affect global climate than a flea can steer a charging bull. One volcanic eruption in Iceland or Indonesia can wipe out decades of carbon emissions reductions. Another fantastically hubristic notion is that hydraulic fracturing is responsible for the recent earthquake activity in Oklahoma. Really? Fracking drives holes only a couple thousand feet into the ground, but earthquake faults are tens of miles deep.

All of this alarmist hokum aims at curtailing oil production and gasoline consumption — things that make this country great — and larding government treasuries with more means to make us miserable. - Salvatore Scafidi, San Diego

Lesson in critical thinking needed

The author of your July 24 op-ed piece supporting Hamas, who identifies himself as a “professor of communication at UCSD,” might want to go back to school and get himself an education in critical thinking.

His article (“Another view: Gaza blockade is act of war”) purports to take on what he calls a “refrain” that “Israel has to defend itself from rockets … no country can permit its citizens to endure such attacks.”

The author’s response to the simple logic of the “refrain” is to dismiss the significance of Israeli actions like the withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, and to apply ridiculously hyperbolic terms like “starvation” and “imprisonment” to describe Israel’s partial blockade and Israeli knowledge of phone numbers in Gaza.

The self-proclaimed Jewish Voice for Peace member concludes his article by sidestepping any response to the “refrain” and by using the hyperbolic terms to make the case for continuing the war. - Jay Harris, La Jolla

Hamas uninterested in solving conflict

Rabbi Philip Graubart (“A La Jolla rabbi in Israel: A letter home,” July 18) clearly described the moral difference between Hamas and Israel. It’s too easy for us in the West to expect that all conflicts can be solved with rational compromise.

In this case, Hamas has repeatedly shown no desire to resolve the conflict and live side-by-side with Israel in peace. It had that chance after Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. Now it’s time to help other Palestinians replace Hamas and show a willingness to live as peaceful neighbors with Israel. - Jeffrey Liber, San Diego

Sheriff, partners are saving lives

I am the mother of a son who suffers from heroin addiction. I fully appreciate that there are more people in the United States losing their lives daily to opiod overdoses than to car accidents.